Beowulf: The Truth about the Dragon Battle
by Damian Gentleheart
Summary: What if the story of Beowulf vs. the Dragon wasn't the entire story? The other side of the story you never heard...


The great Geatland warrior-turned-king, Beowulf, made his way up to the tower on foot.

He would have been astride his horse except his horse had stopped at the bottom of the hill. "Damn horses. Why do they all have to be so skittish?" he asked himself. "I only need to visit this one last time and I'm set for the rest of my life."

He shrugged his shoulders. "Ok, maybe _life _isn't accurate. More like death." He walked on in silence, the stone tower getting bigger and bigger. He stared at the hole in the base of said tower with a mixture of finality and pain. "Yes. Death is the right word."

He finally reached the tower, stopping outside the cave, for that's what it was. A dragon's cave, marked by the shed scales around the entrance. He touched a hand to the cool rock around the entrance, then pulled a wineskin from his back. "Feuerbauch! Feuerbauch the dragon! Are you in?!" He stopped and opened the bag, pouring a little onto the ground. "It's me, Beowulf! I bring wine to share!"

He waited a few minutes for an answer, then shook his head. "He must be asleep." He said to himself, corking the whine and walking in.

He walked for half an hour, although down here everything was too dark to see much of anything. He began to slow down as he heard something breathing; it sounded like someone was pushing a bellows. He turned a corner and saw a dragon lying atop a pile of gold. The large being was stretched out across the whole cave, about 8' 2" across, including the tail. His dark green scales looked black in the dim light shed by the glowing moss on the walls. "Feuerbauch." Beowulf said forcefully. "Feuerbauch!"

When Feuerbauch continued to lie there, he sighed and drew his sword. "Sorry about this." He said, swinging his sword with all of his might towards the great green neck.

SMACK! The side of the blade struck Feuerbauch's neck and his eyes shot open, large, catlike eyes in heavy scaled brows. Feuerbauch roared and jumped on top of Beowulf, who had thrown away his sword when the dragon had roared. They wrestled for ten minutes; sometimes Beowulf had the upper hand, sometimes Feuerbauch.

Feuerbauch got lucky and managed to pin Beowulf on the ground. Beowulf stared up at the dragon with no fear as its muzzle approached his face and opened slowly to expose the many sharp teeth and the long, forked tongue. He turned his face away as the dragon exhaled on him. "I win." he said, chuckling.

Feuerbauch got off Beowulf and laid back down on his gold, still chuckling, his eyes closed. Beowulf stood up and brushed himself off, holding his nose. "Yes, you win. But you needn't have wrestled me; your breath would have been enough to knock me flat." He stated as he searched the cave for his sword.

Feuerbauch just opened his mouth and laughed again. "What you smelled was probably that deer I had late last night. It was wonderful; I wish you had been here for it." He sniffed the air. "You have wine?" It was somewhere between a statement and a question, but Beowulf nodded and, pulling the wineskin from his back and walked over to his friend, pouring a little into his open maw. "Mmmmm… this has been properly aged. Were you not in possession of it, I would say a dragon had made this wine. But I know better; not many dragons would ever give something up without dying, and none around here." He rolled his large orange eyes and shook his head. "Well, none except me. But I digress." He looked over his horde, looking for something. Finding it, he wrapped his tail around the gilded gold stool and set it in front of Beowulf. "Take a seat; God only knows how tired you must be. Now, what did you come to me for this time? You know my horde is mostly open to you."

Beowulf nodded as he sat down on the stool. He sighed as the pressure was taken off his feet. "Ahhh. Much better. Thank you, Feuerbach, that was exactly what I needed." He put one hand on his one of his legs and looked up at his long time friend. "You're right in assuming I needed something, but it's not just gold; I need a favor." Feuerbach raised an eyebrow. "I need you to kill me."

Feuerbach blinked, shook his head, then cleaned out his ear fans with a clawed finger. "Hold on, I must have some dirt in my ear. I could have sworn I just heard you say you want me to kill you." When he looked at Beowulf, his head reared back. "You can't be serious! You're my friend; I would never do such a thing to a friend, not even as a favor!"

Beowulf held up a hand to stem the flow of words from the dragon. "Hear me out, Feuerbach. I need you to kill me so I can be immortal." Reading Feuerbach's look of intense confusion correctly, he moved on to explain. "I am getting old, as you well know. My kind only life a short life compared to yours, about 100 years. I'm in my 60's now; I'm certainly not getting any younger. I want to be remembered in the hearts and minds of my people for ages, and how better to do that than fighting a dragon? I already defeated Grendel and his mother; all other monsters are cake compared to them. Except dragons."

Feuerbach snorted, small sheets of flame shooting from his nostrils. "Of course dragons are better; we've got flight, scales, claws, and flaming breath. What more do we need?" He lowered his head to look directly into Beowulf's eyes. "But I have a few problems with your plan. First off, if I AM the dragon you are referring too, by 'defeating', you'll be leaving me dead. I would like to be able to life my full 100 centuries of life, thank you. Two, if you somehow figure out how to bring me back, what would I get out of it?"

Beowulf smiled and put his hand on his friend's nose. "In answer to your first question, I won't be killing you." He pulled out a dagger. "Watch."

Feuerbach looked on in curiosity, then shock as Beowulf stabbed himself in the chest. "BEOWULF!" He bellowed. Beowulf smiled and pulled the dagger away, showing Feuerbach that the dagger could collapse.

"It is always helpful to have an inventor. He created this for the actors who tell my story; this is how I'll 'kill' you. As for your second question, my planned successor, Wiglaf, already knows about you and will be giving you half of my stored treasure after he is crowned." He placed his hand on Feuerbach's nose again, rubbing a little. "If I die killing a dragon, I will be remembered forever as the greatest of the Geats. I want to go out a hero, Feuerbach, not an aged king. And you're the only one I can trust not to let his instinct get the better of him."

Feuerbach sighed and pulled away from Beowulf. "Fine. You will have your fight. But I must let you know that I don't approve; I would much prefer to have you live, for your conversations are most often interesting and highly entertaining."

Beowulf smiled and hugged Feuerbach's nose. "Thank you my old friend. See you in a hundred centuries. Expect me to come back in a month; it'll give you enough time to cause some destruction." Beowulf smiled and stood, as did Feuerbach.

Feuerbach sighed and held out a single clawed finger, which Beowulf shook. "Goodbye, old friend. May you have safe passage and may the Ancient Dragons accept you into their fold."

Beowulf nodded grimly, a smile on his face. "And may God bless you with as many years as you could want."

The great Geatland king turned and left to go find his horse.


End file.
